could truly say, "I have esteemed the words of Thy mouth more than my necessary food;" or, in words applied to Him in the Scripture, "Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do Thy will, O my God." What that "will," what that "work" was, our Lord proceeds to describe under another figure taken from earthly and familiar things, the figure of the harvest. It appears to have been a sort of proverb among their countrymen, dating the expression from the end of seed-time, or from one of their religious festivals, or some other fixed period, "There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest." Thus the Lord may have reminded them of what about that time of year they were wont to say; making use of this proverbial saying to contrast therewith the readiness of the nations even then to be gathered into His Kingdom; the distance of the material, the nearness of the spiritual harvest. As regards that, it was still seed-time, and they would have to wait for the appointed weeks of the harvest; but as regards this, seed-time was, in a sense, over and gone, and the harvest was come. The Law and the Prophets and the Baptist had sown the seed; it was reserved for the Apostles and their successors to gather in the fruit.

LXXIX.

THE SAME SUBJECT-continued.

St. John iv. 36-38.

And he that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal: that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together. And herein is that saying true, One soweth, and another reapeth. I sent you to reap that whereon ye bestowed no labour: other men laboured, and ye are entered into their labours.

Our Lord intimates another difference between the two harvests of which He had been discoursing, the difference in their results. "For the fruit of an earthly harvest profiteth

lost sheep of the house of Israel.' For though afterwards the Gospel was fully preached among the Samaritans, and Churches planted there, yet "the conversion of this people lay not in the plan of the official life of our Lord."3 In these two days however the corner stone of the Church afterwards to be built up there was laid. Here the Lord sowed the seed, which afterwards the Apostles reaped. The Evangelist adds what the believers in that city said afterwards to the woman." They acknowledged that her testimony was true. Like the Queen of Sheba, who had heard in her own land of the fame of Solomon, after she had seen and heard him for herself, was constrained to say, "It was a true report that I heard in mine own land of thy acts and of thy wisdom. Howbeit I believed not the words, until I came, and mine eyes had seen it and, behold, the half was not told me: thy wisdom and prosperity exceedeth the fame which I heard." So these men are constrained to say concerning this greater than Solomon who is here. Now we believe, not merely because of thy word, but because of His own word; for we have heard Him for ourselves, and we know of a surety and acknowledge that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour not of Jew only or Samaritan, but of all who in every nation believe in Him.

LXXXI.

HE COMETH INTO GALILEE.

St. John iv. 43-45.

Now after two days he departed thence, and went into Galilee. For Jesus himself testified, that a prophet hath no honour in

1 St. Matt. x. 5, 6.

2 Acts viii.

3 Alford.

Eph. ii. 17-20.

5 Lampe draws a curious and fanciful analogy between the Samaritan woman and the Greek Church. Bearing in mind the date at which he wrote, while the memory of Cyril Lucar," the Protestant Patriarch of Constantinople," as Gibbon (ch. xlvii.)

calls him, was yet fragrant in the west, we shall not be surprised at this. See an Article on The Eastern Church in The Edinburgh Review, No. 218.

6

Augustine (in S. Jo. xv. 33) regards the woman as the Church, at whose call men come to Christ, and receive from Him the two precepts of charity, love to God, and love to our neighbour.

his own country. Then when he was come into Galilee, the Galilæans received him, having seen all the things that he did at Jerusalem at the feast for they also went unto the feast.

1

After the two days He had spent at Sychar, our Lord resumes His journey into Galilee, which was His original destination; the stay in Samaria being, as it were, a short episode. Though circumstances may sometimes justify our departure for a time from a plan laid down, we must ever bear the end in view, returning into the main road as soon as may be. Now the Lord came into Galilee, to Cana3 and other parts of Galilee; passing by and declining for the present to visit Nazareth, which, being His own country, we should have expected Him to visit first. But the people there were unbelieving, and proved, as he was constrained to say when at last He went there, that "a prophet hath no honour in his own country." But, in the other parts which He visited at this time, the Galileans received Him; received Him favourably and listened to Him; induced to act thus the more readily from having seen the things that He did at Jerusalem, His purging the Temple and other signs He showed, at the late Festival of the Passover, to which, in obedience to the Divine command, they had gone up. "They that are diligent and constant in attending on public ordinances, some time or other meet with more spiritual benefit than they expect."

St. Matt. xiii. 54-58; St. Mark vi. 1-6; St. Luke iv. 16-24. A comparison of these passages justifies our restricting this expression to Nazareth, and proves moreover that it can

5

not mean Capernaum, as Chrysostom and others after him. De Dieu cites a kindred case in this Gospel, ch. iii. 22, where Jerusalem is contrasted with Judæa.

St. John ii. 23, in the original. • Henry.

LXXXII.

THE COURTIER'S SON HEALED.

St. John iv. 46-50.

So Jesus came again into Cana of Galilee, where he made the water wine. And there was a certain nobleman, whose son was sick at Capernaum. When he heard that Jesus was come out of Judea into Galilee, he went unto him, and besought him that he would come down, and heal his son: for he was at the point of death. Then said Jesus unto him, Except ye see signs and wonders, ye will not believe. The nobleman saith unto him, Sir, come down ere my child die. Jesus saith unto him, Go thy way; thy son liveth. And the man believed the word that Jesus had spoken unto him, and he went his way.

In the course of this tour in Galilee, our Lord comes again to the town of Cana, the scene of His first miracle. About five and twenty miles lower down lay the town of Capernaum, upon the western shore of the Lake of Gennesaret, or, as it is sometimes called, the Sea of Galilee, or the Sea of Tiberias. At this latter place was a nobleman, an officer it is supposed in the court of Herod. He had probably gone thither to visit his son, who was ill there. When his son grew worse, and there seemed no hope of his recovery, the anxious father, having heard of our Lord's return into Galilee, went to Him and besought Him that He would come down and heal His son.1 Herein this man showed faith, but it was limited and imperfect. He believed that Jesus could heal his son, but not without coming down to Capernaum to do so. Therefore the Lord rebukes him because, like the rest of his countrymen, he needs a miracle; because, unlike those men of Sychar whom He had just left, he would not believe because of His "word," but required

Compare the case of Naaman, 2 Ki. v. 9-11. "Had he been quite faithless, he had not taken such pains to come to Christ; had he been faithful, he had not made this suit to

Christ when he was come..... Come down,' as if Christ could not have cured him absent; Ere he die,' as if that power could not have raised him being dead."-Bp. Hall.

2

signs and wonders to be shown.' Yet the very rebuke was mingled with encouragement. It implied help. And the man, in the intensity of parental affection, and under the pressure of his need, unrepelled by the seeming severity, only repeats his request the more earnestly, "Sir, come down ere my child die." But while this furnishes additional proof of the man's earnestness, it again shows, and shows more plainly, the limited character of his faith. It is "Come down ere my child die." He still thought our Lord's presence necessary. He knew not that He could heal him with a word. In our Lord's answer He again tries the man's faith, and in the trying strengthens it.3 "The man believed the word." This is the point of the narrative. He whose faith had been so limited that he thought it necessary that our Lord should come, who besought Him to come quickly lest his son should die and be beyond the reach of His aid, now believes the word; believes not only that Jesus can heal him though at a distance, but that He has healed or at the least begun to heal him. He no longer requires our Lord to come. His faith has been raised to the conviction of a spiritual power in Jesus to which bodily absence is no obstacle. "And he went his way;" went not in doubt or haste, but leisurely, in contrast with the manner wherewith he had come.4

LXXXIII.

THE SAME SUBJECT-continued.

St. John iv. 51-54.

And as he was now going down, his servants met him, and told him, saying, Thy son liveth.

1 St. John vi. 30.

2 Note the diminutive in the original; my dear child, my little one.

3 "Our merciful Saviour meets those in the end whom he crosses in the way.... How oft doth He not hear to our will, that He may hear us to our advantage!... Let us ask

Then inquired he of them

what we think best; let Him give what He knows best."-Bp. Hall.

Capernaum being but about five and twenty miles distant from Cana, he might without difficulty have returned thither the same day; yet we find (vv. 52, 53 below) that he did not return till the day following.